{"id":45237,"date":"2026-09-11T14:15:21","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T12:15:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=45237"},"modified":"2026-09-11T14:15:21","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T12:15:21","slug":"russia-expands-cultural-educational-infrastructure-across-african-nations","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/russia-expands-cultural-educational-infrastructure-across-african-nations\/","title":{"rendered":"Russia expands cultural, educational infrastructure across African nations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Russia is expanding its network of cultural and educational centres across Africa as Moscow seeks to broaden its influence beyond military and security partnerships on the continent.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Russia&#8217;s humanitarian agency announced that the new centres will promote Russian language education, scientific exchange, and cultural initiatives, while co-ordinating various development projects in host nations.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The diplomatic push marks a strategic shift toward soft-power projection following years of expanding defense ties across the Sahel region.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Military juntas in Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso previously severed long-standing security alliances with former colonial power France, turning instead to Russian mercenary forces, now reorganised under the Russian Ministry of Defence as the Africa Corps.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The expansion of Russian cultural infrastructure comes in the wake of a complete withdrawal of Western and international forces from the region, including the termination of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Mali.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;ChannelAfrica&#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":21847,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[26],"class_list":["post-45237","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Russia promotes language and Science centres to deepen African alliances","published_date":"2026-09-11 14:14:22","news_description":"Russia promotes language and Science centres to deepen African alliances","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/45237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/45237\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45238,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/45237\/revisions\/45238"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=45237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}